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Maria P. P. Root (born September 13, 1955)[1] is a clinical psychologist, educator, and public speaker based in Seattle, Washington. Her areas of work include multiracial families, multiracial identity, cultural competence, trauma, workplace harassment, and disordered eating. She is an international authority on mixed heritage identity, credited with publishing the first contemporary work on mixed-race people. She has presented lectures and training in various countries, both in and outside of academia.
Root has edited two books on multiracial people and produced the Bill of Rights for Racially Mixed People.[2][3] The U.S. Census referred to these two texts in the deliberations that resulted in a "check one or more races" format to the race question for the 2000 census.[4] In 1997, she received the American Psychological Association (APA) Award for Distinguished Contribution to Psychology in the Public Interest.[5]
Root is a former president of the Washington State Psychological Association.[2] She has served as Chair of the APA Board for the Advancement of Psychology in the Public Interest[6] and as a member-at-large on the Board of APA Division 45 (Society for the Psychological Study of Ethnic Minority Issues).[2] Currently she has her own private practice. She has served on the advisory council of the Association of MultiEthnic Americans and the board of advisors of the Mavin Foundation.[7][8] She co-founded the Journal for Critical Mixed Race Studies[9] in 2011.[10]